Friends: Just when I thought the weather couldn't get any worse, I rounded a bend into an even fiercer gusting wind lashing me with an even thicker barrage of rain, utterly deflating what little thrill remained of bicycling along the storied Dardenelles, that narrow channel that separates Europe from Asıa.
The steady stream of ships heading to and from Istanbul and beyond to the Black Sea and Russia brought back memories of bicycling along the Yangtze River in China. It too was a major waterway that had a long and storied history going back centuries and in present times was clogged with huge freighters transporting all manner of goods. In both it wasn't just a scattered few freighters, but freighters strung across the waterway and closely stacked bows to sterns as if they were drafting one another. It almost looked unrealistic, like a Hollywood dramatization to exaggerate the quantity of ships. It was frightening to think there was so much stuff being transported.
I could hardly dwell on it as I worried about staying warm and in motion. The lashing wind was just one of my problems. It wasn't much above freezing and I was getting soaked. I had given up on my wool gloves long ago, as they were too saturated to retain much warmth, and had resorted to my heavy winter gloves with plastic bags over them. My fingers were barely functional, not that I was doing any braking or even shifting.
It was utterly ridiculous to be biking in such conditions, just how I like it. When I saw a pair of police cars with lights flashing coming towards me, I thought they were coming to my rescue.
I was hoping when I'd ferried across the Dardanelles yesterday from Çanakkale that the weather might at least be drier. I thought there might be a "Straight Effect," with more precipitation on the eastern side of the straight, similar to Lake Michigan's "Lake Effect," producing more rain and snow on eastern side of the lake. There did seem some initial validity to the theory, but it may have been more due to an "Afternoon Effect" of the sun gaining some strength, even though it failed to make an appearance.
I was able to bike through the Gallipoli Battlefield National Park, just across the Dardanelles, without being rained upon, though the weather remained sultry and windy. I had the park virtually to myself. It extends over twenty miles, but I contented myself with the five mile stretch through the heart of it, the part thickest with monuments and cemeteries and where the worst of the WWI fighting took place. There were climbs steeper than ten per cent, made much steeper by the stiff head winds, up to the ridge where trenches between the invading Allied forces and the Turks lay no more than twenty-five feet apart.
The several month long battle in 1915 was one of the more horrific and hard fought of WWI, or any war, resulting in more than 50,000 deaths on both sides. Atatürk, as a colonel, led the Turks successful defense and his heroics led him to being promoted to general and fully launched his career. There are a number of plaques with his quotes stirring his troops to fight. Every Turk knows his command, "I don't order you to fight. I order you to die. In the time it takes us to die, other troops can come and take our places." He himself took a bullet to the heart that was deflected by his watch. The location where it happened is a sacred site to the Turks.
High on one ridge with a panoramic view is perhaps the most noteworthy cemetery, Lone Pine, devoted to the 5,700 Australians who died there. A lone pine stands in its center. It was planted in 1990 from a seed germinated from a pine cone an Australian soldier sent back to Australia in 1915. Quite a few New Zealanders lost their lives as well at Gallipoli. Many Aussies and Kiwis make pilgrimages to Gallipoli, inspired in part by the acclaimed movie "Gallipoli" starring a young Mel Gibson by Australian Peter Weir.
I had my quietest campsite of the trip on the fringe of the park, distant from any main road or human habitation or dogs, feeling no reverberations whatsoever from the hell on earth Gallipoli had been for tens of thousands during this campaign.
A hell of my own awaited me. I had to take down my tent and pack up in a drizzle, only slightly less fun than setting up in the rain. I was resigned to having to seek out a hotel if the rain didn't let up. It only got worse, meaning now I had wet socks from yesterday as well as the ones I was wearing.
It took three hours to reach the next town--Gelibolu--22 miles away. When I saw signs to a ferry wharf I was fully prepared to hop aboard if there was one to Istanbul 175 miles away. But no, the ferry just crossed the Dardanelles. With a population of 29,000 and as a gateway to the National Park there were several hotels to choose from.
The first I tried was closed. The next one had no electricıty. Finally, the third had a room and it came with a heater, just what I needed. I strung a clothes line in front of it and hung up my gloves and three pairs of just washed socks and draped the rest of my clothes around the room. The heat didn't extend much beyond a foot from the heater, but that was enough.
I had bought a paper the day before to stuff into my shoes that night to draw out the moisture, as the candle in my tent didn't generate enough heat to dry much of anything. I needed the rest of the paper today for my truly soaked shoes.
On page five of the paper were a couple of paragraphs on Turkey's prime minister Erdoğan finishing second to the head of Wikileaks in a poll of Time magazine's readers for its Man of the Year. That should have been page one news. I had no idea he was receiving so much attention back home or that there was such a strong Turkish community voting on such matters.
He recently sent a couple of fire fighting planes to help Israel douse its worst forest fire ever. Perhaps that brought him some extra attention. It has been a prominent story here, as Israel and Turkey have effectively cut off relations since last May when Israeli commandos killed nine Turks on a Turkish boat trying to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. Seeking resolution to that issue has been a top story ever since. The Turks are demanding an apology and reparations to the families. Everyone has reacted with great favor to Erdogan's gesture helping Israel with its fire fighting.
If the winds don't let up, it could take me four days to reach Istanbul, less than 175 miles away. I notice British Air has bargain Christmas Day flights. If I can switch my flight home from Athens a month later without much penalty, I may have to do it. It wasn't part of the plan to be biking this far north in December and January. I'd be somewhere in the warm and sunny climes of the Middle East if Syria hadn't denied me entrance. I've been very glad to get to know Turkey better, but I don't need much more than the two months I've had.
Later, George
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Ezine, Turkey
Friends: This Aegean coastal weather remains in flux. Temperatures ought to be in the 50s. Yesterday morning it was 26 when I broke camp and didn't warm up enough until early afternoon to melt the patches of ice along the road. Usually I put on my booties to keep my feet dry. Now I wear them to keep my feet warm.
The sun was not to be seen all day. At least there was no wind to speak of for a change until late in the afternoon when a breeze descended from the mountains to the east bringing with it a light sprinkling. Light or not, it was wet and about the last thing I needed. It is no fun setting up my tent in the rain and even less fun retreating into it for the night with wet clothes.
My candle was down to its last inch, probably not enough for the four hours I'd be sitting in my tent before sleep. I hadn't needed it for weeks until the night before and would certainly need its modicum of warmth this night when I was battling both wet and cold. The first store I tried didn't carry candles, but luckily the next one did.
Luck was with me again when I came upon a grove of big-trunked old olive trees with sprawling branches that provided some shelter, enabling me to erect my tent without more than a few drops wetting it. The candles didn't provide enough heat to much dry my gear, but they did make a welcome dent in the cold. At least the only thing wet I had to put on against my skin the next morning were my tights. It had warmed up to 42, not such an intolerably cold temperature. My body temperature soon had the tights relatively dry.
The sun had returned after a day's absence. The forecast calls for two sunny days and then more rain, just as I will be heading east along the bay to Istanbul for my final 200 miles after I cross the Dardanelles into Europe tomorrow.
For the third time in two weeks since leaving Adana I encountered cyclists heading southward to Syria and warmer temperatures. It was an English couple in their late 30s. They were the fourth husband and wife team I've met, all of different nationalities--Swiss, Polish, French and English. The only lone cyclist has been a German. The English were two-and-a-half months into their dream trip--England to South Africa. They were worried about their visa to Syria, as it had expired. They weren't able to renew it in Istanbul and were told they couldn't do it in Ankara, the capital, either. The wife was planning to fly back to England from Ankalya to take care of it at the Syrian embassy in London.
Last night for the first time in over two weeks since leaving Adana I was without a newspaper to read. It was back to Lucretius and "On the Nature of the Universe", the fifth of six books I brought with me. I welcomed the break from the Turkish newspapers, as they've finally become a bit repetitive with story after story about Turkey not being worthy of the EU and the upcoming elections and student unrest and Premier Erdoğan wanting to sue the US for the Wikileak's accusation that he has eight Swiss bank accounts. There are still the odd interesting stories such as a crack-down on institutes in Istanbul that guarantee that they can cure stuttering in a week and the big surge of knife orders for all the knife factories in Bursa, Turkey's knife manufacturing center, for the Feast of the Sacrifice holiday.
There have been two student demonstrations recently against the ruling AKP party and its Islamic slant. It has been in power since 2002 and will most likely win the upcoming elections. It will be the longest Turkey has been ruled by the same party since its inception in 1923. Even though the police reacted with violence to the students and their egg-throwing, AKP officials acknowledge that the students have a right to demonstrate. They all say Turkey is a democracy, a point they overly emphasize, as some doubt how much of a democracy it is.
The president commented, though, the eggs could have been put to better use in omelets. Omelets would not have brought the students all the attention they have gotten. Columnist after columnist has tried to fathom what has ticked the students off, as they don't seem to have anything specific to be riled about, unlike the students in Great Britain, upset that their fees are being tripled.
The unrest of the students is another symptom of the underlying divisions in the country. The economy is thriving. It is the fifteenth largest in the world, increasing at a rate only exceeded by China, but not everyone is benefiting. There are malls on the outskirts of the larger cities full of international companies from Nike to Dockers, but they are like ghost towns, built with anticipation for a demand that isn't quite there yet.
The EU issues an annual report on how Turkey is progressing towards qualifying for membership in the EU. Two prime areas where it still falls short are freedom of the press and women's rights. Turkey ranks 101st out of 109 countries on gender equality. Government officials profess to not care all that much about the EU issue, saying the EU needs Turkey more than Turkey needs the EU. Erdoğan says, "No matter what they say, Turkey is part of Europe." Still it has to disturb all to be continually rejected, to be considered not worthy. İn China last year a common refrain from government officials was their desire to meet "western standards," from the quality of its highways to encouraging people not to spit in public. The Turks refer to meeting "international standards."
The country doesn't seem overly Islamic other than the call to prayer five times a day, but there are fears that it is headed in that direction, what with scarves being allowed in the universities now and regular increases in taxes on alcohol and other subtle advances. But still there are billboards with women in bikinis that wouldn't be tolerated in a truly Islamic country.
Later, George
The sun was not to be seen all day. At least there was no wind to speak of for a change until late in the afternoon when a breeze descended from the mountains to the east bringing with it a light sprinkling. Light or not, it was wet and about the last thing I needed. It is no fun setting up my tent in the rain and even less fun retreating into it for the night with wet clothes.
My candle was down to its last inch, probably not enough for the four hours I'd be sitting in my tent before sleep. I hadn't needed it for weeks until the night before and would certainly need its modicum of warmth this night when I was battling both wet and cold. The first store I tried didn't carry candles, but luckily the next one did.
Luck was with me again when I came upon a grove of big-trunked old olive trees with sprawling branches that provided some shelter, enabling me to erect my tent without more than a few drops wetting it. The candles didn't provide enough heat to much dry my gear, but they did make a welcome dent in the cold. At least the only thing wet I had to put on against my skin the next morning were my tights. It had warmed up to 42, not such an intolerably cold temperature. My body temperature soon had the tights relatively dry.
The sun had returned after a day's absence. The forecast calls for two sunny days and then more rain, just as I will be heading east along the bay to Istanbul for my final 200 miles after I cross the Dardanelles into Europe tomorrow.
For the third time in two weeks since leaving Adana I encountered cyclists heading southward to Syria and warmer temperatures. It was an English couple in their late 30s. They were the fourth husband and wife team I've met, all of different nationalities--Swiss, Polish, French and English. The only lone cyclist has been a German. The English were two-and-a-half months into their dream trip--England to South Africa. They were worried about their visa to Syria, as it had expired. They weren't able to renew it in Istanbul and were told they couldn't do it in Ankara, the capital, either. The wife was planning to fly back to England from Ankalya to take care of it at the Syrian embassy in London.
Last night for the first time in over two weeks since leaving Adana I was without a newspaper to read. It was back to Lucretius and "On the Nature of the Universe", the fifth of six books I brought with me. I welcomed the break from the Turkish newspapers, as they've finally become a bit repetitive with story after story about Turkey not being worthy of the EU and the upcoming elections and student unrest and Premier Erdoğan wanting to sue the US for the Wikileak's accusation that he has eight Swiss bank accounts. There are still the odd interesting stories such as a crack-down on institutes in Istanbul that guarantee that they can cure stuttering in a week and the big surge of knife orders for all the knife factories in Bursa, Turkey's knife manufacturing center, for the Feast of the Sacrifice holiday.
There have been two student demonstrations recently against the ruling AKP party and its Islamic slant. It has been in power since 2002 and will most likely win the upcoming elections. It will be the longest Turkey has been ruled by the same party since its inception in 1923. Even though the police reacted with violence to the students and their egg-throwing, AKP officials acknowledge that the students have a right to demonstrate. They all say Turkey is a democracy, a point they overly emphasize, as some doubt how much of a democracy it is.
The president commented, though, the eggs could have been put to better use in omelets. Omelets would not have brought the students all the attention they have gotten. Columnist after columnist has tried to fathom what has ticked the students off, as they don't seem to have anything specific to be riled about, unlike the students in Great Britain, upset that their fees are being tripled.
The unrest of the students is another symptom of the underlying divisions in the country. The economy is thriving. It is the fifteenth largest in the world, increasing at a rate only exceeded by China, but not everyone is benefiting. There are malls on the outskirts of the larger cities full of international companies from Nike to Dockers, but they are like ghost towns, built with anticipation for a demand that isn't quite there yet.
The EU issues an annual report on how Turkey is progressing towards qualifying for membership in the EU. Two prime areas where it still falls short are freedom of the press and women's rights. Turkey ranks 101st out of 109 countries on gender equality. Government officials profess to not care all that much about the EU issue, saying the EU needs Turkey more than Turkey needs the EU. Erdoğan says, "No matter what they say, Turkey is part of Europe." Still it has to disturb all to be continually rejected, to be considered not worthy. İn China last year a common refrain from government officials was their desire to meet "western standards," from the quality of its highways to encouraging people not to spit in public. The Turks refer to meeting "international standards."
The country doesn't seem overly Islamic other than the call to prayer five times a day, but there are fears that it is headed in that direction, what with scarves being allowed in the universities now and regular increases in taxes on alcohol and other subtle advances. But still there are billboards with women in bikinis that wouldn't be tolerated in a truly Islamic country.
Later, George
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Aliağa, Turkey
Friends: I knew it was cold yesterday morning, cold enough for me to put on tights for the first time since I came down from the mountains three weeks ago, but I didn't realize it was cold enough for snow.
A wicked northerly wind had blown in the afternoon before, plummeting the temperatures and bringing with it a light drizzle during the night. The wind was even colder and more fierce and ferocious the next day, lashing into me when I left the forest I was camped in and hit the road. It was a few minutes before I could begin riding, as I had a fair bit of mud to scrape off my tires and pry out of my brakes and from my cleats after pushing my bike through a muddy fıeld.
I made use of a trickle of water streaming down the slight incline where I met up with the paved road to help clean my bike shoes. I didn't enjoy one bit being pelted by the harshly driven, cold rain. A cold rain is bad enough, but even worse when it is accompanied by a merciless head wind.
In less than a mile, as I gained altitude, the rain turned into sleet and then snow. I didn't expect this at all. If it became snow I could brush it off and not be so wet, but it remained a nasty mix of sleet and rain and snow lashing me at a 45 degree angle. Though it didn't gather on the road, it was accumulating along side it and at the higher elevations. I quickly realized that I needed to put booties over my shoes, as my feet were growing cold and damp. It was a couple miles before I came to the shelter of a gas station, almost too late, but the coverings still made a difference, the first time I had needed them.
Izmir, Turkey's third largest city with a population of 2.7 million, was less than twenty miles away. With it looking dark and foreboding and no let up in the weather, I was reconciled to making it a short day and seeking refuge at the first affordable hotel I came upon.
I was soon swallowed up by the urban sprawl giving me some protection from the wind, but that made little difference in the chill that was penetrating to my bones. I passed a pickup truck making a delivery that had come down from the mountains. It was full of snow. A crowd of boys had descended upon it as it unloaded and were pelting each other with snow balls. I was lucky they didn't spot me. I was looking for warm shelter of any sort to retreat to so I could regain feeling in my fingers. A grocery store had to do. I took my time wandering the aisles, waiting until the last minute to buy my daily pound-and-a-half container of yogurt, not wishing to hold anything cold in my hands.
It was just another mile to the heart of the city and the hotel district. I stopped at the first one I came to, a dive of a place, just as I prefer. It had no heat, but it was dry and they let me bring my bike in and the bedroom included a stack of blankets and there was hot water in the shower down the hall. The bed, as in the only other hotel I've stayed at on this trip, wasn't meant for six-footers, but at least it didn't have a frame, so my ankles could dangle over the end in my down sleeping bag.
I lay huddled under the blankets for an hour eating and warming up before venturing out into the city looking for warmth. This was much like Wuhan where I was a year ago in China waiting to meet up with Stephen when it was hit by a freak cold spell and snow storm and only the most expensive of hotels had heat.
Like there it was hard to find a place with heat. I walked about trying to generate warmth, stopping at little cafes heated only by the open-sided heating elements roasting the spinning hunks of meat that were sliced for doners. Some went for as little as a lira, the cheapest I had encountered anywhere in Turkey. I was also thrilled to discover some of the sidewalk vendors selling sesame rolls from carts also had hard boiled eggs, another first in these travels. I stocked up.
A large shopping mall along Izmir's huge bay didn't even have heat, nor did the small restaurants that lined the streets. Everyone walked about with hunched up shoulders, tightly holding their arms to their sides, trying to retain some heat. Dogs lay tightly curled up in balls in whatever nook they could find protected from the wind. An Internet cafe was warm enough that I could take off my hat and unzip my jacket, though not remove it. A small English language bookstore I searched out to buy a newspaper was retaining some warmth and had a couple of chairs for reading. The owner didn't object to me plopping down for a spell after I purchased a newspaper. The storm was front page news, as it had hit Istanbul the day before, blanketing it with snow. The bookshop owner said this was the first snow that Izmir had had in ten years.
I found some encouragement from weather.com. It reported it would be sunny the next day and up to 45 degrees. Just give me a clear sky and I could cope with the cold. I had several layers in reserve that I had yet to put to use. I just needed to dry out my shoes and tights and I'd be set to go. Maybe I wouldn't have to take a bus the rest of the way to Istanbul after all or escape Turkey altogether. One option was to take a ferry over to Athens from Izmir.
As luck would have it, the next day was a Sunday, so I had little traffic to contend with on the six-lane highway skirting the bay out of town. I was equally happy that the road bypassed the surrounding snow-drenched mountains and has been flat all the way to Aliağa, allowing me to settle into a steady comfortable pace, freed from having to power up any climbs generating a sweat and having to unlayer and then layer back up for the descents. It's been fabulous to be merrily biking along once again, though for the first time in a couple of weeks the scenery no longer includes orange groves. They were still harvesting oranges in Ephesus, fifty miles south of Izmir. I'm back amongst the olive groves, my most likely camp site tonight. They've been fully harvested, but are now being pruned with chain saws and clippers.
There was less than a two hundred mile long banana belt at the southern most point of Turkey with banana vendors dotting the road side. There have still been orange sellers today in the cold. Turkey is so agriculturally rich, just one of seven countries that are net food exporters, that some city streets and parks are lined with orange trees. There were oranges for the taking on the sidewalks. I picked up my fırst batch shortly before I arrived in Adana and met Zekeriya. When I shared them with him, he warned me that there is an inedible wild strain of oranges. And so these were. They looked normal, but their insides were mostly pulp and yellowish rather than orange and very sour and bitter.
That was just one of two food faux pas I've committed so far. The first was buying a container that said yogurt, but was a cheese spread. Both David and I made the same mistake in a small shop early in our travels. What David thought was yogurt was actually butter, which was even less use to him than the cheese spread was to me.
He offered me some of the butter to spread on my bread as we sat along the road picnicking. I was happy to give it a try. Then I saw him take a huge spoonful. He had noting to spread it out. I somewhat gagged as I anticipated him thrusting it down his throat. But instead he flung it on to the dirt, shocking me more than if he had gobbled it down. He said he couldn't possibly use the entire container and didn't care to carry more weight than he needed. That was when I fully realized,that if a spoonful of butter could make a difference to him, he truly was obsessed with limiting his load to the bare minimum, not even bringing a towel, using his shirt or pull over to dry off after washing.
I quickly said that I would have taken it. He gladly gave me the rest of his butter. I would occasionally get the last few swigs of a liter container of juice that he didn't wish to carry. Every morning he was eager to find a garbage can to rid himself of his several ounces of litter from the night before.
He carried three water bottles, just as I did, but never had water in more than one of them until the last moment of the day before camping, sometimes not finding any and having to rely on mine, as I tried to keep my three bottles near capacity at all times. On long ascents he would pour water out of his bottle to lighten his load. He would have fit right into the peloton, where the racers toss aside bottles as soon as they are empty and throw them away empty or not before the day's sprint to the finish.
One of my great food discoveries was a bit of a gamble--a hard-plastic pie plate full of a hard-packed, shredded food that looked like it might be a snack. It was moderately priced, so I took a gamble on it. An older man in the store pointed at it and gave me a pat on the back, congratulating me on my choice. A guy working in the store pointed out a bottle of syrup, implying that it went with it, but it was a bit pricey. I was willing to try whatever it was on its own.
When I gave it a taste, it was very dry and tasteless, but had a vaguely familiar taste. After a few moments I realized it was a flattened version of shredded wheat. Broken up, it went perfectly with yogurt. I later learned that it is a dessert that one pours warm milk on and then honey or syrup. I may be the only person in all of Turkey eating it with yogurt. It has become a regular part of my diet, something I have nearly every day, except on those rare occasions when I find cornflakes.
Later, George
A wicked northerly wind had blown in the afternoon before, plummeting the temperatures and bringing with it a light drizzle during the night. The wind was even colder and more fierce and ferocious the next day, lashing into me when I left the forest I was camped in and hit the road. It was a few minutes before I could begin riding, as I had a fair bit of mud to scrape off my tires and pry out of my brakes and from my cleats after pushing my bike through a muddy fıeld.
I made use of a trickle of water streaming down the slight incline where I met up with the paved road to help clean my bike shoes. I didn't enjoy one bit being pelted by the harshly driven, cold rain. A cold rain is bad enough, but even worse when it is accompanied by a merciless head wind.
In less than a mile, as I gained altitude, the rain turned into sleet and then snow. I didn't expect this at all. If it became snow I could brush it off and not be so wet, but it remained a nasty mix of sleet and rain and snow lashing me at a 45 degree angle. Though it didn't gather on the road, it was accumulating along side it and at the higher elevations. I quickly realized that I needed to put booties over my shoes, as my feet were growing cold and damp. It was a couple miles before I came to the shelter of a gas station, almost too late, but the coverings still made a difference, the first time I had needed them.
Izmir, Turkey's third largest city with a population of 2.7 million, was less than twenty miles away. With it looking dark and foreboding and no let up in the weather, I was reconciled to making it a short day and seeking refuge at the first affordable hotel I came upon.
I was soon swallowed up by the urban sprawl giving me some protection from the wind, but that made little difference in the chill that was penetrating to my bones. I passed a pickup truck making a delivery that had come down from the mountains. It was full of snow. A crowd of boys had descended upon it as it unloaded and were pelting each other with snow balls. I was lucky they didn't spot me. I was looking for warm shelter of any sort to retreat to so I could regain feeling in my fingers. A grocery store had to do. I took my time wandering the aisles, waiting until the last minute to buy my daily pound-and-a-half container of yogurt, not wishing to hold anything cold in my hands.
It was just another mile to the heart of the city and the hotel district. I stopped at the first one I came to, a dive of a place, just as I prefer. It had no heat, but it was dry and they let me bring my bike in and the bedroom included a stack of blankets and there was hot water in the shower down the hall. The bed, as in the only other hotel I've stayed at on this trip, wasn't meant for six-footers, but at least it didn't have a frame, so my ankles could dangle over the end in my down sleeping bag.
I lay huddled under the blankets for an hour eating and warming up before venturing out into the city looking for warmth. This was much like Wuhan where I was a year ago in China waiting to meet up with Stephen when it was hit by a freak cold spell and snow storm and only the most expensive of hotels had heat.
Like there it was hard to find a place with heat. I walked about trying to generate warmth, stopping at little cafes heated only by the open-sided heating elements roasting the spinning hunks of meat that were sliced for doners. Some went for as little as a lira, the cheapest I had encountered anywhere in Turkey. I was also thrilled to discover some of the sidewalk vendors selling sesame rolls from carts also had hard boiled eggs, another first in these travels. I stocked up.
A large shopping mall along Izmir's huge bay didn't even have heat, nor did the small restaurants that lined the streets. Everyone walked about with hunched up shoulders, tightly holding their arms to their sides, trying to retain some heat. Dogs lay tightly curled up in balls in whatever nook they could find protected from the wind. An Internet cafe was warm enough that I could take off my hat and unzip my jacket, though not remove it. A small English language bookstore I searched out to buy a newspaper was retaining some warmth and had a couple of chairs for reading. The owner didn't object to me plopping down for a spell after I purchased a newspaper. The storm was front page news, as it had hit Istanbul the day before, blanketing it with snow. The bookshop owner said this was the first snow that Izmir had had in ten years.
I found some encouragement from weather.com. It reported it would be sunny the next day and up to 45 degrees. Just give me a clear sky and I could cope with the cold. I had several layers in reserve that I had yet to put to use. I just needed to dry out my shoes and tights and I'd be set to go. Maybe I wouldn't have to take a bus the rest of the way to Istanbul after all or escape Turkey altogether. One option was to take a ferry over to Athens from Izmir.
As luck would have it, the next day was a Sunday, so I had little traffic to contend with on the six-lane highway skirting the bay out of town. I was equally happy that the road bypassed the surrounding snow-drenched mountains and has been flat all the way to Aliağa, allowing me to settle into a steady comfortable pace, freed from having to power up any climbs generating a sweat and having to unlayer and then layer back up for the descents. It's been fabulous to be merrily biking along once again, though for the first time in a couple of weeks the scenery no longer includes orange groves. They were still harvesting oranges in Ephesus, fifty miles south of Izmir. I'm back amongst the olive groves, my most likely camp site tonight. They've been fully harvested, but are now being pruned with chain saws and clippers.
There was less than a two hundred mile long banana belt at the southern most point of Turkey with banana vendors dotting the road side. There have still been orange sellers today in the cold. Turkey is so agriculturally rich, just one of seven countries that are net food exporters, that some city streets and parks are lined with orange trees. There were oranges for the taking on the sidewalks. I picked up my fırst batch shortly before I arrived in Adana and met Zekeriya. When I shared them with him, he warned me that there is an inedible wild strain of oranges. And so these were. They looked normal, but their insides were mostly pulp and yellowish rather than orange and very sour and bitter.
That was just one of two food faux pas I've committed so far. The first was buying a container that said yogurt, but was a cheese spread. Both David and I made the same mistake in a small shop early in our travels. What David thought was yogurt was actually butter, which was even less use to him than the cheese spread was to me.
He offered me some of the butter to spread on my bread as we sat along the road picnicking. I was happy to give it a try. Then I saw him take a huge spoonful. He had noting to spread it out. I somewhat gagged as I anticipated him thrusting it down his throat. But instead he flung it on to the dirt, shocking me more than if he had gobbled it down. He said he couldn't possibly use the entire container and didn't care to carry more weight than he needed. That was when I fully realized,that if a spoonful of butter could make a difference to him, he truly was obsessed with limiting his load to the bare minimum, not even bringing a towel, using his shirt or pull over to dry off after washing.
I quickly said that I would have taken it. He gladly gave me the rest of his butter. I would occasionally get the last few swigs of a liter container of juice that he didn't wish to carry. Every morning he was eager to find a garbage can to rid himself of his several ounces of litter from the night before.
He carried three water bottles, just as I did, but never had water in more than one of them until the last moment of the day before camping, sometimes not finding any and having to rely on mine, as I tried to keep my three bottles near capacity at all times. On long ascents he would pour water out of his bottle to lighten his load. He would have fit right into the peloton, where the racers toss aside bottles as soon as they are empty and throw them away empty or not before the day's sprint to the finish.
One of my great food discoveries was a bit of a gamble--a hard-plastic pie plate full of a hard-packed, shredded food that looked like it might be a snack. It was moderately priced, so I took a gamble on it. An older man in the store pointed at it and gave me a pat on the back, congratulating me on my choice. A guy working in the store pointed out a bottle of syrup, implying that it went with it, but it was a bit pricey. I was willing to try whatever it was on its own.
When I gave it a taste, it was very dry and tasteless, but had a vaguely familiar taste. After a few moments I realized it was a flattened version of shredded wheat. Broken up, it went perfectly with yogurt. I later learned that it is a dessert that one pours warm milk on and then honey or syrup. I may be the only person in all of Turkey eating it with yogurt. It has become a regular part of my diet, something I have nearly every day, except on those rare occasions when I find cornflakes.
Later, George
Friday, December 10, 2010
Selçuk, Turkey
Friends: Turkey's Mediterranean coast line abounds with ruins 2,000 years old and older. If they had any sort of bicycle connection, I'd be stopping several times a day and making detours left and right to give them a look. But no, they are just ruins that all look the same after a while, so I've just been giving a glance to those that are right on my route, awaiting Ephesus, the class of the ruins and the only World Heritage Site among them.
Most of those I've seen truly are ruins, a rubble of rocks and stones only minimally restored and uncovered. When I entered the ruins of Olympos a week ago through the back entrance from the beach, I reached the front entrance without being aware of ruins at all they were so overgrown. The 15,000 seat amphitheater in Side was closed for restoration, so I could only be impressed by its exterior walls. The agora, the open space for commerce in Graeco-Roman cities, leading up to it, was typical of most of the ruins, haphazardly littered with fallen pillars and large stones that had been the building blocks for assorted structures.
Having seen the ruins of Pompei and Angor Watt and Tikal and Machu Pichu and Palenque and the Terra Cotta Warriors of Xian, these were all quite trivial. And I'm sorry to report Ephesus wasn't much more impressive. I arrived early this morning, much earlier than I anticipated, well before they were open, thanks to a four a.m. deluge that flooded my tent, forcing me to make a quick evacuation.
I'm not sure if I was lucky to have been staying in a campground or not, as the campground had such a hard surface it didn't allow for any drainage. If I'd been in a forest, it would have been a different story. But the rain came down so fast and hard, I may have been swamped there as well. At least in the campground I had the refuge of the bathrooms to retreat to.
The road this morning was an obstacle course of mud and rocks and other debris that had washed down from the hillsides, so I might have been caught in a flash flood if I hadn't been in a campground. I chose to pay to camp as I found myself in Kusadasi, a large port and tourist town, with dark descending. I feared the twelve mile stretch from Kusadasi to Ephesus would all be built up with no possibility of wild camping. Turns out it wasn't and there would have been some good forest camping.
But I didn't mind at all a shower and a worry-free night in a safe zone, with no panic stabs to the heart when I heard a dog bark or the rustle of leafs or the snap of a twig. It was a rare pleasure to take an evening meander on the bike. My ride took me along the beaches of Kusadasi and to the dock where a huge cruise ship lay at anchor and past the blocks and blocks of tacky souvenir shops and some of the 700 hotels in this sea-side resort.
My early arrival at Ephesus allowed me to circle its circumference and peer in from its two entrances before it opened and bus loads of tourists from the cruise ship descended upon the place. I could see that these ruins hardly warranted the twenty lira entry fee. Ten maybe, even though that is close to my daily budget. A large crane marred the one photo I would have liked of the 25,000 seat amphitheater built into a hillside.
Ephesus also offered a couple of Christian pilgrimage sites. The apostle John and the Virgin Mary lived out their lives nearby. John wrote his Gospel here. A church built over his tomb in Selçuk, just two miles from Ephesus, also lays in ruins on a hillside. Mary's home is four miles beyond Ephesus up a long, steep climb out in the countryside. St. Paul also lived in Ephesus for several years. His letter to the Ephesians is one of the books of the New Testament.
Next significant site up the coast, 250 miles away, is the ancient city of Troy, another set of ruins. They don't promise much either, as Lonely Planet says a huge wooden Trojan Horse was placed at its entrance to give the tourists something to photograph. Whether or not the site stirs the blood, I will at least gain a first hand image to associate with the storied site that Homer immortalized. Tomorrow morning I will be passing through the city where Homer lived, Izmir, Turkey's third largest city.
It remains dank and overcast. I need a splash of daylight to dry out my soaked tent or else I will have quite a bit of swabbing to do this evening after I set it up and before filling it with my gear. At least I saved my sleeping bag before the water level inundated me this morning.
Later, George
Most of those I've seen truly are ruins, a rubble of rocks and stones only minimally restored and uncovered. When I entered the ruins of Olympos a week ago through the back entrance from the beach, I reached the front entrance without being aware of ruins at all they were so overgrown. The 15,000 seat amphitheater in Side was closed for restoration, so I could only be impressed by its exterior walls. The agora, the open space for commerce in Graeco-Roman cities, leading up to it, was typical of most of the ruins, haphazardly littered with fallen pillars and large stones that had been the building blocks for assorted structures.
Having seen the ruins of Pompei and Angor Watt and Tikal and Machu Pichu and Palenque and the Terra Cotta Warriors of Xian, these were all quite trivial. And I'm sorry to report Ephesus wasn't much more impressive. I arrived early this morning, much earlier than I anticipated, well before they were open, thanks to a four a.m. deluge that flooded my tent, forcing me to make a quick evacuation.
I'm not sure if I was lucky to have been staying in a campground or not, as the campground had such a hard surface it didn't allow for any drainage. If I'd been in a forest, it would have been a different story. But the rain came down so fast and hard, I may have been swamped there as well. At least in the campground I had the refuge of the bathrooms to retreat to.
The road this morning was an obstacle course of mud and rocks and other debris that had washed down from the hillsides, so I might have been caught in a flash flood if I hadn't been in a campground. I chose to pay to camp as I found myself in Kusadasi, a large port and tourist town, with dark descending. I feared the twelve mile stretch from Kusadasi to Ephesus would all be built up with no possibility of wild camping. Turns out it wasn't and there would have been some good forest camping.
But I didn't mind at all a shower and a worry-free night in a safe zone, with no panic stabs to the heart when I heard a dog bark or the rustle of leafs or the snap of a twig. It was a rare pleasure to take an evening meander on the bike. My ride took me along the beaches of Kusadasi and to the dock where a huge cruise ship lay at anchor and past the blocks and blocks of tacky souvenir shops and some of the 700 hotels in this sea-side resort.
My early arrival at Ephesus allowed me to circle its circumference and peer in from its two entrances before it opened and bus loads of tourists from the cruise ship descended upon the place. I could see that these ruins hardly warranted the twenty lira entry fee. Ten maybe, even though that is close to my daily budget. A large crane marred the one photo I would have liked of the 25,000 seat amphitheater built into a hillside.
Ephesus also offered a couple of Christian pilgrimage sites. The apostle John and the Virgin Mary lived out their lives nearby. John wrote his Gospel here. A church built over his tomb in Selçuk, just two miles from Ephesus, also lays in ruins on a hillside. Mary's home is four miles beyond Ephesus up a long, steep climb out in the countryside. St. Paul also lived in Ephesus for several years. His letter to the Ephesians is one of the books of the New Testament.
Next significant site up the coast, 250 miles away, is the ancient city of Troy, another set of ruins. They don't promise much either, as Lonely Planet says a huge wooden Trojan Horse was placed at its entrance to give the tourists something to photograph. Whether or not the site stirs the blood, I will at least gain a first hand image to associate with the storied site that Homer immortalized. Tomorrow morning I will be passing through the city where Homer lived, Izmir, Turkey's third largest city.
It remains dank and overcast. I need a splash of daylight to dry out my soaked tent or else I will have quite a bit of swabbing to do this evening after I set it up and before filling it with my gear. At least I saved my sleeping bag before the water level inundated me this morning.
Later, George
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Milas, Turkey
Friends: As I sat in the faculty lounge with Adnan, another bicycling university English teacher, before joining him for his eight p.m. class, he warned me his students could be a bit rambunctious. It is the nature, he explained, of the evening classes. The students have had a long day and are restless and not so attentive.
It is one of the reasons teachers are paid extra for such classes. It is an inconvenience, as well, particularly for those with a family such as Adnan, who has two children, nine and seventeen years old. Adnan, though, is one of those who offers to teach such classes. He welcomes the extra money, as despite Turkey's thriving economy, he's not feeling as much of the benefits of it as he would like.
The university where he teaches in Muğla has 25,000 students, more than a third of the city's 65,000 residents. It is six miles from the city center, not conducive for a night-time bike ride, so we drove out, my first travel other than by bike since arriving in Turkey nearly seven weeks ago. The campus was aswarm with students even at that hour. There aren't enough classrooms to serve all the students during normal hours, so classes run from eight in the morning until ten in the evening.
Adnan and I lost track of the time as we talked biking. Once I learned that Adnan was one of the organizers of a local four-day annual bike tour (http://www.muglabisiklet.org/ ) that he and his club started four years ago around a nearby bay, that's all I wanted to talk about. They were inspired by a ride a couple of his friends happened upon while visiting Santa Cruz, California. Such an event had never been attempted in Turkey. Their ride has become such a success, they have to limit the number of participants to less than 200. They have inspired similar mini-tours around the country.
Like the grand daddy of such rides, RAGBRAI--the several decade old ride across Iowa, which Adnan was unaware of--they enlist trucks to carry all the gear of the participants and arrange large group campsites. Two Americans from the air base outside of Adana participated in the last. He'd like to attract more riders from outside Turkey and make it a truly international event.
When we rushed into the classroom two floors below a few minutes late there was loud chatter coming from all corners. My appearance somewhat stilled the commotion. Several students cleared a space for me to sit beside Adnan's desk. He introduced me as an American bicycling around Turkey and said that they could ask me whatever they wanted. The first question was where was I from in America. At the news I was from Chicago that immediately set off a flurry of questions about the Bulls and the several Turkish players in the NBA.
These were younger students than those I addressed in Adana. I was asked if I knew various Turkish pop singers. I had to reply in the negative to all of them. Someone wanted to know my email address so he could send me some Turkish music. "How old are you," someone blurted. At my response of 59 another interjected, "That's old."
They wanted to know what my job was and if I was retired. Adnan had told me to keep my answers as simple as I could, so I couldn't fully explain that I like my messengering job so much that I've never considered it work, so, to a degree, I've been retired ever since I left a corporate administrative assistant job over 35 years ago. I just said that I'm not retired, and that I like my job so much that it doesn't even seem like work since I enjoy riding the bicycle so much. I consider it fun.
My every response was followed by animated kibitzing all round, so I could barely hear or fully understand the next question. I had to rely on Adnan at times to explain what was being asked. He also offered a quick Turkish translation of most of my responses.
After failing to recognize any of Turkey's present pop fıgures, I was asked what I thought of Atatürk. I said learning about what a great man he was and the many things he did to establish modern Turkey was one of the highlights of my visit to Turkey and that when I returned to America I would search out a biography of him to learn even more. That drew a round of applause. I was also applauded when I said I have traveled in so many countries it is impossible for me to learn the language wherever I go, but I like being an example that one does not need to speak the language of a country to travel there.
To the marriage question I replied that from my earliest years I never wanted to get married. My parents were supposedly happily married, but hardly shared any interests and barely even seemed to be friends. If that was marriage, I wasn't interested. If I was going to spend my life with someone, I wanted that person to be a best friend. I've had girl friends that were that way, but we were never interested in having children, so there was no need to get married. Plus I liked to travel too much to settle down. That drew thumbs up from a bunch of the boys.
I was asked if I drank beer. I said no, so that I'd make a good Muslim. That brought a round of exclamations saying, "We drink beer and we are Muslims." Someone asked if I had a place to stay that night and said I was welcome to stay at his apartment. Others shouted out that I could stay with them too. I told them I was already taken care of.
At one point several of the students in the front row started calling me Sugar Uncle. Adnan said that is a term of respect. After half an hour someone asked if he could have his picture taken with me. Adnan said that would have to wait until the class was over. When that moment arrived everyone rushed up to the front of the class and swarmed around me, initially for a group photo, and then they took turns having their own private photo with their cell phone. Everyone, boys and girls, gave me a handshake and thanked me.
It was another remarkable testimony to how desperately hungry young Turks are to meet an American and try out their English. It was almost unfathomable to them to have one in their midst. As with Zekeriya in Adana, Adnan had no space for me to sleep over, but had no problem finding students to put me up.
After initially connecting up with Adnan earlier that afternoon at a restaurant beside Atatürk's statue in the center of Muğla, we were joined by two of his students who he had arranged to be my hosts. It was a half mile walk to their apartment. It was nearly identical to the one I stayed at in Adana--a sparsely decorated rectangular living room lined with five couches, a hallway leading to three bedrooms and a small kitchen. The students prepared a dinner of finely chopped eggs and potatoes that they fried and served in the pot they were cooked in. They called it "student food" and "yumpat"--the "yum" from "yumarta" for egg and "pat" for potatoes.
They spread a newspaper on the living room floor for a tablecloth and five of us sat around it, stabbing at the food with forks and supplementing it with bread, cheese, olives and jam. The jam was an after thought when an older roommate came in and figured that was something the American would like.
Only one of the four spoke enough English to maintain a semblance of a conversation, greatly assisted by a pair of dictionaries. He had to do a considerable amount of translating for everyone else. At one point he said, "We are all Kurdish. We are like the blacks of America."
"Then one of you will become president," I replied.
"I don't think so," he said.
Unfortunately his English wasn't adequate to explain the stone-throwing culture of the east they all grew up in. Later, when he said he didn't like to use the library, I asked if it was because he felt discriminated against as a Kurd. He said, "No, they don't know we're Kurdish. I can't explain." It is unpleasant enough, though, that rather than using the free Internet the library provides, he'll go to an Internet cafe and pay for it despite his limited funds. They don't have a television in their apartment. If he wished, he could watch DVDs of American movies at the library to help with his English, but even that can't lure him.
One of the roommates came from the city where David and I were so violently attacked by gangs of kids trying to knock us off our bikes. There was a lot of animated Kurdish conversation after each exchange of English. It seemed as if some of them were trying to decide if they cared to accept the American in their midst. Feeling like second class citizens clearly left a chip on their shoulders. Still, a couple of them greatly longed to go to America, asking for my advice and wondering if marrying an American would gain them entry. One wanted to know if joining a bicycle club would help him get a visa. I'm not one to discourage anyone from riding a bicycle, so I said, "It wouldn't hurt."
Two of the four came from families with ten children. Another was to be married in six months and wanted to have twelve children, enough to field a soccer team. There was the usual religion question. It is such a part of their lives here, being called to pray five times a day, it is at the forefront of their thought. They think they are more devoted to their religion than people of any other faith, and they might be right.
We were up until well after midnight, even though they knew I normally go to sleep at nine pm in my tent. A platter of cookies was brought out at midnight along wıth a two liter bottle of coke. Two of them had classes starting at eight the next morning, but they were in no hurry to go to bed.
Two of them asked if they could be Facebook friends and sent me requests then and there on their cellphones. I was able to confirm them while I had some Internet time after my session wıth Adnan's class and he did some further teaching. They were thrilled to have an American Facebook friend, and had already perused my profile and photos when I returned from my classroom appearance.
Breakfast was another round of "student food," with a loaf of fresh baked bread. One asked, "Do you eat bread in America?" They were going to be late to class, but their session with a bonafide English-speaker would more than make up for it. All the courses of the English majors are English--four of them taught by three different teachers. As first year students, they had more than a leg-up on learning the language. If eagerness counts, they will be fluent before the year is out.
Later, George
It is one of the reasons teachers are paid extra for such classes. It is an inconvenience, as well, particularly for those with a family such as Adnan, who has two children, nine and seventeen years old. Adnan, though, is one of those who offers to teach such classes. He welcomes the extra money, as despite Turkey's thriving economy, he's not feeling as much of the benefits of it as he would like.
The university where he teaches in Muğla has 25,000 students, more than a third of the city's 65,000 residents. It is six miles from the city center, not conducive for a night-time bike ride, so we drove out, my first travel other than by bike since arriving in Turkey nearly seven weeks ago. The campus was aswarm with students even at that hour. There aren't enough classrooms to serve all the students during normal hours, so classes run from eight in the morning until ten in the evening.
Adnan and I lost track of the time as we talked biking. Once I learned that Adnan was one of the organizers of a local four-day annual bike tour (http://www.muglabisiklet.org/ ) that he and his club started four years ago around a nearby bay, that's all I wanted to talk about. They were inspired by a ride a couple of his friends happened upon while visiting Santa Cruz, California. Such an event had never been attempted in Turkey. Their ride has become such a success, they have to limit the number of participants to less than 200. They have inspired similar mini-tours around the country.
Like the grand daddy of such rides, RAGBRAI--the several decade old ride across Iowa, which Adnan was unaware of--they enlist trucks to carry all the gear of the participants and arrange large group campsites. Two Americans from the air base outside of Adana participated in the last. He'd like to attract more riders from outside Turkey and make it a truly international event.
When we rushed into the classroom two floors below a few minutes late there was loud chatter coming from all corners. My appearance somewhat stilled the commotion. Several students cleared a space for me to sit beside Adnan's desk. He introduced me as an American bicycling around Turkey and said that they could ask me whatever they wanted. The first question was where was I from in America. At the news I was from Chicago that immediately set off a flurry of questions about the Bulls and the several Turkish players in the NBA.
These were younger students than those I addressed in Adana. I was asked if I knew various Turkish pop singers. I had to reply in the negative to all of them. Someone wanted to know my email address so he could send me some Turkish music. "How old are you," someone blurted. At my response of 59 another interjected, "That's old."
They wanted to know what my job was and if I was retired. Adnan had told me to keep my answers as simple as I could, so I couldn't fully explain that I like my messengering job so much that I've never considered it work, so, to a degree, I've been retired ever since I left a corporate administrative assistant job over 35 years ago. I just said that I'm not retired, and that I like my job so much that it doesn't even seem like work since I enjoy riding the bicycle so much. I consider it fun.
My every response was followed by animated kibitzing all round, so I could barely hear or fully understand the next question. I had to rely on Adnan at times to explain what was being asked. He also offered a quick Turkish translation of most of my responses.
After failing to recognize any of Turkey's present pop fıgures, I was asked what I thought of Atatürk. I said learning about what a great man he was and the many things he did to establish modern Turkey was one of the highlights of my visit to Turkey and that when I returned to America I would search out a biography of him to learn even more. That drew a round of applause. I was also applauded when I said I have traveled in so many countries it is impossible for me to learn the language wherever I go, but I like being an example that one does not need to speak the language of a country to travel there.
To the marriage question I replied that from my earliest years I never wanted to get married. My parents were supposedly happily married, but hardly shared any interests and barely even seemed to be friends. If that was marriage, I wasn't interested. If I was going to spend my life with someone, I wanted that person to be a best friend. I've had girl friends that were that way, but we were never interested in having children, so there was no need to get married. Plus I liked to travel too much to settle down. That drew thumbs up from a bunch of the boys.
I was asked if I drank beer. I said no, so that I'd make a good Muslim. That brought a round of exclamations saying, "We drink beer and we are Muslims." Someone asked if I had a place to stay that night and said I was welcome to stay at his apartment. Others shouted out that I could stay with them too. I told them I was already taken care of.
At one point several of the students in the front row started calling me Sugar Uncle. Adnan said that is a term of respect. After half an hour someone asked if he could have his picture taken with me. Adnan said that would have to wait until the class was over. When that moment arrived everyone rushed up to the front of the class and swarmed around me, initially for a group photo, and then they took turns having their own private photo with their cell phone. Everyone, boys and girls, gave me a handshake and thanked me.
It was another remarkable testimony to how desperately hungry young Turks are to meet an American and try out their English. It was almost unfathomable to them to have one in their midst. As with Zekeriya in Adana, Adnan had no space for me to sleep over, but had no problem finding students to put me up.
After initially connecting up with Adnan earlier that afternoon at a restaurant beside Atatürk's statue in the center of Muğla, we were joined by two of his students who he had arranged to be my hosts. It was a half mile walk to their apartment. It was nearly identical to the one I stayed at in Adana--a sparsely decorated rectangular living room lined with five couches, a hallway leading to three bedrooms and a small kitchen. The students prepared a dinner of finely chopped eggs and potatoes that they fried and served in the pot they were cooked in. They called it "student food" and "yumpat"--the "yum" from "yumarta" for egg and "pat" for potatoes.
They spread a newspaper on the living room floor for a tablecloth and five of us sat around it, stabbing at the food with forks and supplementing it with bread, cheese, olives and jam. The jam was an after thought when an older roommate came in and figured that was something the American would like.
Only one of the four spoke enough English to maintain a semblance of a conversation, greatly assisted by a pair of dictionaries. He had to do a considerable amount of translating for everyone else. At one point he said, "We are all Kurdish. We are like the blacks of America."
"Then one of you will become president," I replied.
"I don't think so," he said.
Unfortunately his English wasn't adequate to explain the stone-throwing culture of the east they all grew up in. Later, when he said he didn't like to use the library, I asked if it was because he felt discriminated against as a Kurd. He said, "No, they don't know we're Kurdish. I can't explain." It is unpleasant enough, though, that rather than using the free Internet the library provides, he'll go to an Internet cafe and pay for it despite his limited funds. They don't have a television in their apartment. If he wished, he could watch DVDs of American movies at the library to help with his English, but even that can't lure him.
One of the roommates came from the city where David and I were so violently attacked by gangs of kids trying to knock us off our bikes. There was a lot of animated Kurdish conversation after each exchange of English. It seemed as if some of them were trying to decide if they cared to accept the American in their midst. Feeling like second class citizens clearly left a chip on their shoulders. Still, a couple of them greatly longed to go to America, asking for my advice and wondering if marrying an American would gain them entry. One wanted to know if joining a bicycle club would help him get a visa. I'm not one to discourage anyone from riding a bicycle, so I said, "It wouldn't hurt."
Two of the four came from families with ten children. Another was to be married in six months and wanted to have twelve children, enough to field a soccer team. There was the usual religion question. It is such a part of their lives here, being called to pray five times a day, it is at the forefront of their thought. They think they are more devoted to their religion than people of any other faith, and they might be right.
We were up until well after midnight, even though they knew I normally go to sleep at nine pm in my tent. A platter of cookies was brought out at midnight along wıth a two liter bottle of coke. Two of them had classes starting at eight the next morning, but they were in no hurry to go to bed.
Two of them asked if they could be Facebook friends and sent me requests then and there on their cellphones. I was able to confirm them while I had some Internet time after my session wıth Adnan's class and he did some further teaching. They were thrilled to have an American Facebook friend, and had already perused my profile and photos when I returned from my classroom appearance.
Breakfast was another round of "student food," with a loaf of fresh baked bread. One asked, "Do you eat bread in America?" They were going to be late to class, but their session with a bonafide English-speaker would more than make up for it. All the courses of the English majors are English--four of them taught by three different teachers. As first year students, they had more than a leg-up on learning the language. If eagerness counts, they will be fluent before the year is out.
Later, George
Monday, December 6, 2010
Dalaman, Turkey
Friends: An intermittent drizzle along with a few cloud bursts, my first significant rain in more than a month, had me scouting for an early campsite. I was hoping for a good thick pine forest that would provide shelter from the rain and a carpet of pine needles that would provide insulation from the mud.
The night before I'd had a dream campsite in such a setting, so isolated from human habitation my only concerns were being happened upon by a bear or wolf or boar, not that I'd seen any evidence of them, just that I knew they were part of Turkey's wildlife.
I was presently riding through an agricultural belt just inland from the coast flanked by mountains all round. At any time the road could turn upward and forested. An hour earlier I had encountered a young long-haired German cyclist heading the opposite direction repairing a flat tire. He'd been asking permission to camp behind gas stations, just as Zekeriya does when he's touring, and mentioned one thirty miles up the road he'd camped at the night before if need be.
He'd also been taking advantage of couchsurfing.com and warmshowers.com and gave me the email address of someone two days away in Muğla that was part of an ardent cycling community and that he had stayed with. He'd spent three days in Mugla taking cycling trips in the vicinity. He had couches lined up the next two nights, but was going to be hard-pressed to reach the one in Kas that night, delayed by the rain and his flat and more hilly terrain than he expected. He complained too of knee problems that had been limiting his speed. Its nice to have planned accommodations, but it does comprise one's independence. This was his second tour, the first in 2004, a ride through Scandinavia. He'd been eager for another, but had kept putting it off. He was making up for it with this one. He'd been on the road for two months and had four to go.
My hoped-for forest arrived an hour before dark. I couldn't immediately take advantage of it as there was a car parked near where I would have slipped in, a likely mushroom forager. I'd seen a few returning to their cars with their haul. And there had been stands along the road selling mushrooms the past two days. There was another car half a mile later and another. At last I came to a turn-off that had been the previous road, slowly being taken over by weeds, that didn't have anyone parked nearby.
The forest wasn't as thick as I would have liked, but ıt wasn't muddy and it seemed to be deserted, but just after I set up my tent and crawled in I heard some voices in the distance. It was two men bent over plucking fungi. I didn't know if they had seen me, but consoled myself that mushroom hunters weren't likely to be the thieving type. About ten minutes later I heard a voice outside my tent, a middle-aged man wearing a thick pea green coat with the look of a forest ranger. He was quite emphatic that I shouldn't camp there, waving his arms like an umpire signaling a runner safe at home plate and using the word "bandits."
There was just half an hour of light left, but I was almost relieved that I was being forced to relocate, so I wouldn't have to be concerned about someone returning with a gun demanding money as happened in my fırst week in Turkey. With it closer to dark and the mushroom hunters abandoning the forest I figured I could go a mile down the road and slip in. Unfortunately, the forest gave out and I had to pass through a town. It was nearly dark when I came upon a patch of trees that I could disappear into, though it was close to the road and would force me to use my less-illuminating and more concentrated hand-held flashlight rather than brighter and handier headlamp.
But it wasn't like being in eastern Turkey or the highlands where there seemed to me more of an outlaw element. Along the coast is much more Westernized. Many service station rest rooms have toilet paper and sit down toilets along with the squat variety. The horn tooting is negligible and there hasn't been a demand for money from a kid or a stone thrown in days.
The one thing I do miss from the east though is the flat bread, much chewier and calorie-laden than the standard white bread that now predominates. My daily doner kebab comes in a bun rather than wrapped in flat bread. Another difference in this region is the abundance of mini-dumpsters along the road. There is still plenty of roadside litter, but at least there is an attempt to encourage people to be responsible with their trash.
I've also been delighted to see English newspapers with regularity among the many Turkish newspapers on the four-sided display racks out in front of stores. That good news though as been tempered by the discovery that the last time I used an ATM to change money in Adana I was given nearly a one-to-one exchange rate, utter extortion, almost 50% more than the official rate, which I had been charged the other two times I had changed money at ATMs. A newspaper now costs me a dollar fifty, rather than a dollar. Never before have I suffered such an outrageous ATM exchange rate--not in Uganda or Vietnam or China or Bolivia or Venezuela. It was a robbery almost as bad as the armed robbery.
When I reach Muğla, a little over fıfty miles away, I will have completed a 2,500 mile loop of the lower half of Turkey. David and I passed by Muğla our second day in Turkey. I will continue along the coast and reach Istanbul in a week or so and then continue on to Athens. Yesterday's German cyclist warned me that Greece was very very expensive compared to Turkey. At least I have some euros, so I won't have to worry about a thieving ATM for awhile.
Later, George
The night before I'd had a dream campsite in such a setting, so isolated from human habitation my only concerns were being happened upon by a bear or wolf or boar, not that I'd seen any evidence of them, just that I knew they were part of Turkey's wildlife.
I was presently riding through an agricultural belt just inland from the coast flanked by mountains all round. At any time the road could turn upward and forested. An hour earlier I had encountered a young long-haired German cyclist heading the opposite direction repairing a flat tire. He'd been asking permission to camp behind gas stations, just as Zekeriya does when he's touring, and mentioned one thirty miles up the road he'd camped at the night before if need be.
He'd also been taking advantage of couchsurfing.com and warmshowers.com and gave me the email address of someone two days away in Muğla that was part of an ardent cycling community and that he had stayed with. He'd spent three days in Mugla taking cycling trips in the vicinity. He had couches lined up the next two nights, but was going to be hard-pressed to reach the one in Kas that night, delayed by the rain and his flat and more hilly terrain than he expected. He complained too of knee problems that had been limiting his speed. Its nice to have planned accommodations, but it does comprise one's independence. This was his second tour, the first in 2004, a ride through Scandinavia. He'd been eager for another, but had kept putting it off. He was making up for it with this one. He'd been on the road for two months and had four to go.
My hoped-for forest arrived an hour before dark. I couldn't immediately take advantage of it as there was a car parked near where I would have slipped in, a likely mushroom forager. I'd seen a few returning to their cars with their haul. And there had been stands along the road selling mushrooms the past two days. There was another car half a mile later and another. At last I came to a turn-off that had been the previous road, slowly being taken over by weeds, that didn't have anyone parked nearby.
The forest wasn't as thick as I would have liked, but ıt wasn't muddy and it seemed to be deserted, but just after I set up my tent and crawled in I heard some voices in the distance. It was two men bent over plucking fungi. I didn't know if they had seen me, but consoled myself that mushroom hunters weren't likely to be the thieving type. About ten minutes later I heard a voice outside my tent, a middle-aged man wearing a thick pea green coat with the look of a forest ranger. He was quite emphatic that I shouldn't camp there, waving his arms like an umpire signaling a runner safe at home plate and using the word "bandits."
There was just half an hour of light left, but I was almost relieved that I was being forced to relocate, so I wouldn't have to be concerned about someone returning with a gun demanding money as happened in my fırst week in Turkey. With it closer to dark and the mushroom hunters abandoning the forest I figured I could go a mile down the road and slip in. Unfortunately, the forest gave out and I had to pass through a town. It was nearly dark when I came upon a patch of trees that I could disappear into, though it was close to the road and would force me to use my less-illuminating and more concentrated hand-held flashlight rather than brighter and handier headlamp.
But it wasn't like being in eastern Turkey or the highlands where there seemed to me more of an outlaw element. Along the coast is much more Westernized. Many service station rest rooms have toilet paper and sit down toilets along with the squat variety. The horn tooting is negligible and there hasn't been a demand for money from a kid or a stone thrown in days.
The one thing I do miss from the east though is the flat bread, much chewier and calorie-laden than the standard white bread that now predominates. My daily doner kebab comes in a bun rather than wrapped in flat bread. Another difference in this region is the abundance of mini-dumpsters along the road. There is still plenty of roadside litter, but at least there is an attempt to encourage people to be responsible with their trash.
I've also been delighted to see English newspapers with regularity among the many Turkish newspapers on the four-sided display racks out in front of stores. That good news though as been tempered by the discovery that the last time I used an ATM to change money in Adana I was given nearly a one-to-one exchange rate, utter extortion, almost 50% more than the official rate, which I had been charged the other two times I had changed money at ATMs. A newspaper now costs me a dollar fifty, rather than a dollar. Never before have I suffered such an outrageous ATM exchange rate--not in Uganda or Vietnam or China or Bolivia or Venezuela. It was a robbery almost as bad as the armed robbery.
When I reach Muğla, a little over fıfty miles away, I will have completed a 2,500 mile loop of the lower half of Turkey. David and I passed by Muğla our second day in Turkey. I will continue along the coast and reach Istanbul in a week or so and then continue on to Athens. Yesterday's German cyclist warned me that Greece was very very expensive compared to Turkey. At least I have some euros, so I won't have to worry about a thieving ATM for awhile.
Later, George
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Demre, Turkey
Friends: As I approached the small coastal city Demre, I passed a billboard with Santa Claus holdıng a platter of food advertising a restaurant up ahead. The unlikely figure of jolly ol' St. Nic also appeared on a few businesses in town. They had nothing to do with the approach of Christmas, but rather were just acknowledging Demre as the origin of Santa Claus.
Legend has it that a local Catholic bishop back in the 300s, who was later beatified as St. Nicolas, began the tradition of anonymously leaving gifts in people's homes. It was largely for young impoverished women who didn't have enough money for a dowry preventing them from getting married.
His remains are interred in his ancient church. It has become such a tourist attraction that there is a ten lira entry fee. It is presently being restored and is bedecked with scaffolding. Signs to the church read "Noel Baba." A recent sculpture of him stands in front of the church along with another a block away, both with children clinging to his legs.
Less than fifty miles away, the ancient town of Olympos takes credit for starting the Olympics. Overlooking Olympos is one thousand foot high Mount Olympos, a miniature version of the Greek Mount Olympos, the highest mountain in Greece. The Turkey Mount Olympos has patches of flames burning out of its side. They are attributed to a fıre breathing monster Chimera said to reside inside the mountain. Chimera fought a monumental battle with Bellerophon, mounted on hıs winged horse Pegasus, as recounted by Homer.
Well before the Turks' great rivals the Greeks came up with theır Olympics, the Turks ran a race from their Mount Olympos with runners holding torches lit from the eternal flames of Mount Olympos, thus giving birth to the Olympic torch.
Turkey is truly rich with history, also being the site where Noah's Ark came to rest, where Alexander cut the Gordion Knot, where Caesar made his legendary remark "I came, I saw, I conquered," where King Midas was given his golden touch, the Trojan Horse was enlisted, where the term "mausoleum" originated from the tomb of a King Mausalus in Bodrum, one of two sites in Turkey that rank among the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World. An early king was Tantalus, whose name gave us the word "tantalise." The Seven Churches of the Apocalypse mentioned in Revelations were all in Turkey. It goes on and on. I won't be surprised to learn that Turkey also put the first man on the moon.
I am happy that I chose to continue riding Turkey's coast when I reached Antalya, rather than heading inland more directly to Istanbul. One of the factors was the forecast of snow for the interior. It was front page news in the English newspaper I picked up, though the dominant news by far was the Wikileaks hoopla.
It seemed as if every other story in the paper was related to the leaks. The Turks are proud that the greatest portion of the cable leaks so far released relate to Turkey, emphasizing their worldly importance. Every op ed column scoffed at the petty gossipyness of the diplomatic cables, diminishing their respect for America.
There were no real surprises in their content, though the president was forced to denounce old accusations of having a bunch of Swiss bank accounts. One columnist though did thank America for discouraging some generals from mounting a coup. The majority of the cables go back to the Bush era, and the Turks know things are different with Obama. They are pleased that Obama made Turkey his first international visit in April 2009 after he became president.
I feared Antalya would be my last chance to find the "Turkish Daily News" for a week or more, so I made a concerted effort to get one last copy, as I had found it so informative. I went directly to the two hundred dollar a night Sheraton Hotel, the best hotel in town, but it had no English newspapers. I was lucky enough thought to find another of the English papers, "Today's Zaman," along a beach where there were a bunch of luxury hotels.
It was a clone of the "Daily News," a large foldout with no advertising. It too only had one page devoted to sports, with one story on the NBA and the rest mostly on soccer. It devoted several pages to business news celebrating Turkey's booming economy. It too quoted economists expressing worry about all the "hot money" from investors pouring into the country.
A Portuguese company recently bought the operational rights to one of the two toll bridges across the Bosporus Straits to Istanbul. That has people concerned that it may be too profıt-oriented and raise the tolls. Otherwise it didn't name any specific investors, not even hinting that any of the heavyweights such as Soros or Buffet or Towle, are investing in Turkey.
A story by an expat who had lived in Turkey for 25 years recounted the many changes he has seen. He summed it up as, "Less wild dogs in the streets and less poisoning of same. Less smoking. More crime. Far more cars and far fewer horses and donkeys. People around the tourist industry have become a little greedy, less honest and less pleasant."
I was able to bequeath several of the papers I had completed reading on a retired English couple I met at Mount Olympos who were hiking a long coastal trail. I was the first person they had met who spoke more than two words of English other than a Spanish hiker in two weeks. They'd also done a fair amount of bicycle touring--two months in Iceland, a year around Europe and elsewhere. We chatted for more than an hour, all happy to be able to speak our native tongue and unburden ourselves of some of the travails of Turkey.
The ancient ruins of Olympos is a favorite haunt of the backpacker set. A gorgeous beach on an isolated bay lays between the ruins and Mount Olympos. I had to push my bike through the sand to get from one to the other. It was a five-mile, 1,200-foot descent from the coast highway down to the ruins and the beach. A cluster of backpacker hotels featuring huts and tree houses are part of the attraction.
With it the off-season, there were only four others on the beach as I slogged through with my bike. One was a young American with a green bandanna wrapped around hıs forehead. He'd been on the road for seven months and was flying to India from Istanbul in two days. He was all aglow, possibly assisted by the herb that also attracts the backpackers to the scene.
It was a killer of a climb from Olympos back up to the main highway, two thousand feet in seven miles. It may be the last of the big climbs along the coast. It has been relatively flat since, includıng a fifteen mile delightfully winding stretch mostly at sea level that clung to a clıff side from Finike to Demre. I have the dilemma whether to take my time or ride a bit hard to get to İstanbul before the cold sets ın. The temperatures along the coast remain balmy enough for short sleeves once the sun is more than several degrees up above the sea--great cycling.
Later, George
Legend has it that a local Catholic bishop back in the 300s, who was later beatified as St. Nicolas, began the tradition of anonymously leaving gifts in people's homes. It was largely for young impoverished women who didn't have enough money for a dowry preventing them from getting married.
His remains are interred in his ancient church. It has become such a tourist attraction that there is a ten lira entry fee. It is presently being restored and is bedecked with scaffolding. Signs to the church read "Noel Baba." A recent sculpture of him stands in front of the church along with another a block away, both with children clinging to his legs.
Less than fifty miles away, the ancient town of Olympos takes credit for starting the Olympics. Overlooking Olympos is one thousand foot high Mount Olympos, a miniature version of the Greek Mount Olympos, the highest mountain in Greece. The Turkey Mount Olympos has patches of flames burning out of its side. They are attributed to a fıre breathing monster Chimera said to reside inside the mountain. Chimera fought a monumental battle with Bellerophon, mounted on hıs winged horse Pegasus, as recounted by Homer.
Well before the Turks' great rivals the Greeks came up with theır Olympics, the Turks ran a race from their Mount Olympos with runners holding torches lit from the eternal flames of Mount Olympos, thus giving birth to the Olympic torch.
Turkey is truly rich with history, also being the site where Noah's Ark came to rest, where Alexander cut the Gordion Knot, where Caesar made his legendary remark "I came, I saw, I conquered," where King Midas was given his golden touch, the Trojan Horse was enlisted, where the term "mausoleum" originated from the tomb of a King Mausalus in Bodrum, one of two sites in Turkey that rank among the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World. An early king was Tantalus, whose name gave us the word "tantalise." The Seven Churches of the Apocalypse mentioned in Revelations were all in Turkey. It goes on and on. I won't be surprised to learn that Turkey also put the first man on the moon.
I am happy that I chose to continue riding Turkey's coast when I reached Antalya, rather than heading inland more directly to Istanbul. One of the factors was the forecast of snow for the interior. It was front page news in the English newspaper I picked up, though the dominant news by far was the Wikileaks hoopla.
It seemed as if every other story in the paper was related to the leaks. The Turks are proud that the greatest portion of the cable leaks so far released relate to Turkey, emphasizing their worldly importance. Every op ed column scoffed at the petty gossipyness of the diplomatic cables, diminishing their respect for America.
There were no real surprises in their content, though the president was forced to denounce old accusations of having a bunch of Swiss bank accounts. One columnist though did thank America for discouraging some generals from mounting a coup. The majority of the cables go back to the Bush era, and the Turks know things are different with Obama. They are pleased that Obama made Turkey his first international visit in April 2009 after he became president.
I feared Antalya would be my last chance to find the "Turkish Daily News" for a week or more, so I made a concerted effort to get one last copy, as I had found it so informative. I went directly to the two hundred dollar a night Sheraton Hotel, the best hotel in town, but it had no English newspapers. I was lucky enough thought to find another of the English papers, "Today's Zaman," along a beach where there were a bunch of luxury hotels.
It was a clone of the "Daily News," a large foldout with no advertising. It too only had one page devoted to sports, with one story on the NBA and the rest mostly on soccer. It devoted several pages to business news celebrating Turkey's booming economy. It too quoted economists expressing worry about all the "hot money" from investors pouring into the country.
A Portuguese company recently bought the operational rights to one of the two toll bridges across the Bosporus Straits to Istanbul. That has people concerned that it may be too profıt-oriented and raise the tolls. Otherwise it didn't name any specific investors, not even hinting that any of the heavyweights such as Soros or Buffet or Towle, are investing in Turkey.
A story by an expat who had lived in Turkey for 25 years recounted the many changes he has seen. He summed it up as, "Less wild dogs in the streets and less poisoning of same. Less smoking. More crime. Far more cars and far fewer horses and donkeys. People around the tourist industry have become a little greedy, less honest and less pleasant."
I was able to bequeath several of the papers I had completed reading on a retired English couple I met at Mount Olympos who were hiking a long coastal trail. I was the first person they had met who spoke more than two words of English other than a Spanish hiker in two weeks. They'd also done a fair amount of bicycle touring--two months in Iceland, a year around Europe and elsewhere. We chatted for more than an hour, all happy to be able to speak our native tongue and unburden ourselves of some of the travails of Turkey.
The ancient ruins of Olympos is a favorite haunt of the backpacker set. A gorgeous beach on an isolated bay lays between the ruins and Mount Olympos. I had to push my bike through the sand to get from one to the other. It was a five-mile, 1,200-foot descent from the coast highway down to the ruins and the beach. A cluster of backpacker hotels featuring huts and tree houses are part of the attraction.
With it the off-season, there were only four others on the beach as I slogged through with my bike. One was a young American with a green bandanna wrapped around hıs forehead. He'd been on the road for seven months and was flying to India from Istanbul in two days. He was all aglow, possibly assisted by the herb that also attracts the backpackers to the scene.
It was a killer of a climb from Olympos back up to the main highway, two thousand feet in seven miles. It may be the last of the big climbs along the coast. It has been relatively flat since, includıng a fifteen mile delightfully winding stretch mostly at sea level that clung to a clıff side from Finike to Demre. I have the dilemma whether to take my time or ride a bit hard to get to İstanbul before the cold sets ın. The temperatures along the coast remain balmy enough for short sleeves once the sun is more than several degrees up above the sea--great cycling.
Later, George
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